Christopher Dewitt Craig apparently has ties to the University of Northern Colorado, where he previously worked as an assistant men's basketball coach.

Jul. 30, 2013

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A former University of Northern Colorado basketball coach is the man calling himself an “Islamist jihadist” and threatening the demise of Mormons and Catholics at sites across Arizona and Colorado, authorities said Tuesday.

Before being spotted by police in Steamboat Springs last week, Christopher Dewitt Craig reportedly made a stop at Eastern Arizona College in Thatcher, Ariz. A spokesman for the institution said he didn’t believe Craig has ties there.

On July 10, Craig, 32, reportedly entered a classroom at the college, raised a Bible in the air, asked the instructor whether he was Mormon and followed his response with obscenities, college spokesman Todd Haynie told the Coloradoan. Campus police later spotted him driving and pulled him over but let him go.

A campus employee the same day told police Craig asked a female counselor if she was Mormon and, when she said yes, responded with derogatory statements, Haynie said. Police later contacted him at a local Walmart and arrested him on suspicion of disorderly conduct; threatening and intimidating; and interference or disruption of an educational facility.

He was released from the jail in Graham County on July 16, and the district attorney didn’t file charges, Haynie said. The DA couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Then on July 23, Steamboat Springs Police reportedly contacted Craig as he was driving while shooting video of himself wearing a white T-shirt wrapped around his head and bandana over his face. He claimed he was an “Islamic jihadist” and that everyone would know who he was in a couple of weeks, police said.

He was seen two days later, on Thursday, leaving Rocky Mountain National Park but hasn’t been spotted in the Fort Collins area. Fort Collins police told the Coloradoan there is no immediate public danger. Authorities sent a memo Friday to local religious organizations warning them of the man’s alleged threats.

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University of Northern Colorado spokesman Nate Haas said former assistant men’s basketball coach Chris Craig is likely the same man; multiple media entities reported his former ties to the Greeley university Tuesday. According to Craig’s biography, posted on the UNC website, he joined the Bears in summer 2010 after various coaching stops in the United States and Europe.

Craig left UNC in summer 2011, and campus police have no record of interaction with him.

Those at the Islamic Center of Fort Collins hadn’t received any emails or calls bearing negative feedback, nor had members reported any as of Tuesday. Community leader Shakir Muhammad and others, however, are concerned Craig’s self-appointed identity could give people the wrong idea about their faith and strike out, should anyone associate their organization with Craig’s reported actions.

“It’s not the belief that we (Muslims) have,” he said of the threats.

Muhammad hopes for the safety of those targeted and agreed that the title “Islamist jihadist” may have prompted more public fear than if Craig had deemed himself a “disgruntled worker” or volunteer with a Catholic church.

“Today, the word ‘Islamist’ does more to strike concern” than it did before 9/11 pushed it onto the national stage,” he said.